Patrick Stump, "Spotlight"

I have been patiently
(OK, semi-patiently) waiting for the release of the first
full-length by Patrick
Stump, the former Fall Out Boy lead singer and ex-Law &
Order guest star who also happens to possess one of the best
voices in pop today. He also has finely tuned musical instincts; I
saw him play a brief set at SXSW in March, where he pulled off a
Jon Brion-at-Largo style “play all the instruments then loop them”
bit and a Bobby Womack
cover. (It was awesome. Too short, of course, but awesome.)
Last night he released the first single off his forthcoming record,
“Spotlight,” in not one but two forms! Let me say that again:
!!!!

The two tracks are being packaged as a 7-inch, and the A-side
would appear to be “Spotlight
(New Regrets),” a sinewy bit of synthpop that would fit quite
nicely into whatever radio station calls itself The Beat Of [Insert
Your City Here]:

Then there’s “Spotlight (Oh
Nostalgia),” which has a piano bit that reminds me of Billy
Joel’s “My Life” for a split-second and which has a bit more of a
slow-burn build that I think works better with the chorus’ lyrical
sentiment:

Here is hoping that this means more is to come, but in the
meantime, there’s still Folie à Deux, the final Fall Out
Boy record. It’s two years old next month and I have been endlessly
listening to/evangelizing it lately, because this time of year
reminds me of replaying it while riding buses and subways during
short-yet-long gray days that refused to stop blurring into one
another. It’s a really fantastic album that got lost in the
end-of-year shuffle in ’08, and recently it’s served as an
excellent palate cleanser for me when I’ve tried to engage in
“keeping up” by listening to wobbly-cassette “hypnagogic” bullshit
like Autre Ne Veut; in stark, refreshing contrast, Folie à
Deux is pop on blast. Here is “27.” It has the
line “My body is an orphanage, we take everyone in,” which has been
ping-ponging around my head these past few days even though it has
approximately 0% relevance to my own personal visitors’ roster at
this point in time: